Rupert Thomson - The Five Gates of Hell

Nathan glanced at Georgia. Georgia shrugged. Nathan looked at Jed again.

Without his hat on, Jed looked curiously mutilated, raw, no longer whole. The hat seemed such a part of him, almost like a hand or a smile. His pale-brown hair lay flat and lifeless against his skull. A red line crossed his forehead horizontally as if the removal of the hat had been an operation and had left a scar.

For a while nobody spoke.

It was during this silence that Nathan heard a creak. He thought he recognised the sound. It had come from the hallway, it was one of the last six stairs. He looked round and saw the tail of the door handle begin to lift. The door had always been hard to open, ever since Dad had painted the leading edge. Even now, years afterwards, it often stuck. The crack it made as it was pushed from the other side made everybody jump.

The door opened and Yvonne stood in the gap. She had thrown a coat over her nightgown. Her copper hair lifted away from her head on one side where she had slept on it. She clutched her metal box of garlic in her hand. To keep the devils on their toes.

‘I heard a voice.’

She was staring at the red chair, and at Jed, because he was sitting in it.

‘I thought it was him. I thought he was calling me.’

Nathan stood up and walked towards her. ‘Sorry if we woke you, Yvonne.’

Yvonne looked at him. ‘What time is it?’

‘Four-thirty,’ Georgia said.

Yvonne nodded to herself.

Nathan put his hand on her elbow. ‘Come on, Yvonne,’ he said. ‘I’ll take you back to bed.’

At the top of the stairs she stopped and turned to him. ‘It wasn’t him,’ she said.

‘No.’

She gripped his arm. ‘But who was it?’

‘Just a friend.’

He helped her back into bed and drew the covers over her. She lay on her back, her eyes wide as a child’s.

‘I painted him a picture,’ she whispered.

‘I know.’

‘You think he would’ve liked it?’

‘Of course he would.’ He kissed her on the cheek. ‘Now you go to sleep.’

Back in the lounge Jed was still sitting in front of the TV. Nathan sat down next to Jed, but found he couldn’t concentrate. Jed kept scratching himself. First the side of his neck, then an ankle, then his stomach. It was as if his whole body itched, but not all at the same time. Nathan couldn’t help watching. And as he watched he began to imagine the tiny flakes of dead skin building up around the legs of Dad’s chair. He stared at the piece of floor where the chair stood and saw the flakes of skin piling up like snow, and then drifting.

And suddenly he couldn’t watch any more. He had to say something. ‘Jed?’ he said. ‘You seen Georgia?’

Jed didn’t look away from the TV. ‘I think she went outside.’

Out on the terrace birds were beginning to call from the trees, hinges on the door that would soon let morning in. Georgia was sitting on the steps, one leg drawn up against her chest, her cheek resting sideways on her knee. Only the fingers of her right hand moved, twisting the chunks of her amber necklace. The pool trickled and dripped behind her.

‘How’s Yvonne?’ she asked.

‘She’s all right’

‘Her hearing his voice like that,’ and she shuddered.

He sat down beside her. ‘It was only us. She was half asleep and all mixed up. She’ll have forgotten by morning.’

It was still dark in the garden, but dawn had spilled across the sky like acid. It dripped down into the trees, eating night from between the branches. The hedge was no longer the silhouette it had been an hour before; hundreds of individual leaves stood out. When you had been up all night, dawn was like a magic trick: even though you knew what was coming, it still managed to surprise you. It was sinister too: you realised just how slowly the world turned, how slowly and relendessly; you realised there was no escaping it.

Georgia broke the pool’s dark surface with a racing dive. He saw her rise again, her black hair shining, tight against her skull. He looked back towards the house. There was a white face framed in the lounge window. It was Jed, he realised. But not before he’d gone cold. Dad used to stand like that. Stand at the window, looking out into the garden. Then he used to tap on the glass. He couldn’t shout. He had to save his voice, his breath. He couldn’t open the door either and come out. The air itself was dangerous. Too humid, too moist. It collected in his windpipe like moss, it blocked his narrow lungs. Nathan always thought it looked as if Dad was trapped, as if he wanted to get out, but couldn’t. Or he was dead already, under glass. Once, when Dad tapped on the window, Nathan had shouted, ‘Do you HAVE to do that?’ And then, when Dad had looked at him, wounded, he hadn’t been able to explain why he was angry.

The sudden sound of flung beads. But it was just the water spilling off Georgia’s body as she climbed out of the pool. She stood beside him, wrapped in a thick towel, her hands bunched under her chin. ‘I just remembered. He said he killed someone.’

Nathan smiled up at her. ‘It was probably just the coke talking.’

Jed was folded up in the red chair when they went in. One hand supporting his cheek, asleep. The TV was still on. A cartoon chipmunk danced across the lenses of his glasses.

Georgia tilted her head sideways, read the numbers on his wrist. ‘You’re probably right. It’s probably just some phone number.’ She yawned. ‘I’m going to bed.’ She kissed Nathan on the cheek. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’ She laughed. ‘I mean, afternoon.’

He waited till she’d left the room, then he looked down at Jed again. The early morning light caught on Jed’s skin like torn fingernails on wool. He touched Jed on the shoulder.

Jed’s eyes slid open. ‘What’s up?’

‘You did kill someone,’ Nathan said, ‘didn’t you?’

The laughter sifted out of Jed’s nostrils. ‘Where am I sleeping?’ he said.

He shouldn’t have talked so much.

The lights turned red and Jed was so angry, he stamped on the brake much harder than he needed to. His bald tyres screeched on the hot asphalt. A woman almost toppled off her gold high-heeled sandals. She was wearing a T-shirt that said I CAME TO MOON BEACH AND LIVED.

BUT ONLY JUST, Jed thought, through gritted teeth. BUT ONLY JUST.

It was Monday morning. The sun cut down through the sky like a guillotine. He could still feel all that beer and cocaine behind his eyes, he could still feel them in his blood, like grit. His skin didn’t seem to fit this morning. He should’ve known better. He had to keep his eyes clear, his blood pure.

He drove down the promenade and parked close to the Ocean Café. This was where he was supposed to be meeting Carol. He was early. He sat behind the wheel, the radio murmuring. He watched people in bright clothes flash by like parts of a headache. Friday night. OK, so he’d talked too much. But really, who was going to remember? Nathan and that sister of his, they were both so trashed, he doubted they’d remember anything. And even if they did, what of it? Stories about murder and tattoos and gangs, who’d believe stories like that, specially in cold daylight.

He leaned back in his seat, tucked a piece of candy into his cheek, sucked on it thoughtfully. Stories were his ticket to places, they always had been. Now they’d taken him to Blenheim. The word brought a smile to his face. Say there actually were vultures on his tail. They’d never dream of looking in Blenheim. It just wasn’t him. It wasn’t anything like him. He’d really landed on his feet this time.

He celebrated by putting 50 cents in the parking meter when he got out of the car. It always amused him to obey small laws.